


The Angry Ghost

by lenaf007



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Angst, Child Abuse, Ghosts, Horror, M/M, Patricide, Spooky, Suicide, Trauma
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-21
Updated: 2020-09-28
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:06:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26574967
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lenaf007/pseuds/lenaf007
Summary: "Everything in the world came with a price, and that included his office, the beautiful view of Domino City, and the power and respect he now held through KaibaCorp."Late one evening in his office, Seto experiences something supernatural that opens up old wounds and reminds him of his painful past. Seto/Pegasus. Toonshipping.Trigger warning: Suicide, patricide, child abuse, and trauma.
Relationships: Pegasus J. Crawford | Maximillion Pegasus/Kaiba Seto
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13





	1. Chapter 1

Trigger warning: Suicide, patricide, child abuse, and trauma.

Seto swirled his ice water in his glass as he pressed a hand against the cold plate-glass window of his office. Looking out over Domino City in the late hours of the evening was one of his favorite views. He loved watching it come alive with lights from traffic, neon lights, and the enormous flat screen televisions that KaibaCorp had placed throughout. It was beautiful, but he also knew its beauty came with a price.

Everything in the world came with a price and that included his office, the beautiful view, and the power and respect he now held through KaibaCorp. He pulled his hand away from the window, watching the heat impression his skin made fade away.

He still remembered that day like it was yesterday.

#

He came into the office to meet his father as requested. It was almost noon, an odd time for Gozaburo to want to talk, especially since they weren’t going on a lunch meeting. Seto had fully expected his father’s goons to be present. He expected Gozaburo to demand Seto to give back his stock of KaibaCorp. Instead, the room was empty except for the two of them and an odd, icy breeze.

These windows were sealed in place to prevent anyone from falling the seventy-five stories to the ground below. Somehow Gozaburo had cut through the adhesive that kept the glass in place and put the window aside. Icy wind blew into the room, knocking paperwork off of the desk and onto the floor. Seto stared at his father, knowing in that moment that something was terribly wrong.

“You’re early,” Gozaburo grunted, both hands holding the edges of the frame.

Seto’s mind whirled over the past few days: his complete takeover of KaibaCorp, Mokuba betraying Gozaburo and giving Seto his final share, and Seto winning the contest to make the world’s first holographic dueling system for Industrial Illusions. It had all happened so fast. He hadn’t fully understood the toll it had taken on his adopted father’s mind. He hadn’t known at the time that he had uploaded his consciousness into a virtual system. All that Seto knew was that he was about to lose him.

“What are you doing?” Seto had demanded, trying to make sense of it. He had known his father was angry at Seto’s winning strategy, but he hadn’t expected him to be suicidal.

Gozaburo turned to him with the most malicious smile on his lips. “Seto, I have pushed you to your limits, and you did not disappoint me. I pushed you into a corner and you fought your way back out. I was very impressed.”

“Father, please,” Seto’s gaze kept lingering on the open window.

“No, you won, Seto. That game you won completely, and now my company is your prize. This office belongs to you now.”

Seto felt his heart hammer in his chest. He hadn’t expected to see such malice in his father’s eyes as he spoke such praise.

“I have been cruel to you, Seto. I have tried to separate you from your brother, I have beaten you, pushed you beyond your physical and mental limits, and stripped you of your emotion through careful conditioning. I have watched you surpass every challenge, every obstacle, and exceed my every expectation I had in a son.”

Seto felt tears in his eyes. “Please, you don’t have to do this.”

A wicked smile came over his father’s face. “You could push me,” Gozaburo growled. “Kill me like I know you’ve wanted to do for so many years now. Complete this ultimate lesson for me!”

“Father—”

“Do it!” His eyes were wild.

A sob came to Seto’s lips, and he put a hand on the back of a chair to steady himself. His father was right, he had wanted to kill him. He dreamed about it at night when his body ached from the beatings. He wished for it every time he threatened Mokuba’s life. Now that he had the opportunity, he understood the gruesomeness of it, the cruelty, and Seto couldn’t step forward. He couldn’t bring himself to kill him, even though he had hated him for years.

Gozaburo leaned his body out of the window and Seto screamed. His father gave a gruff laugh.

“You can’t do it, can you? You’re too weak.”

Seto winced.

Gozaburo laughed, “You will never be strong enough to beat me, Seto. You will never have the guts to defeat me.”

Then he jumped, and Seto lost a father for the second time.

#

Seto turned away from the window. His hands shook, making the ice in his glass clink together. Even after all he had done, that day still haunted him.

He put his glass down and placed a hand on his desk. Seto had done so much to change the office that he inherited that day. He redecorated the room, rearranged the furniture, put up his own Duel Monsters wall art, but still he couldn’t shake the feeling that the office didn’t fully belong to him. He felt like he was sharing it still with his father.

KaibaCorp was nothing like what his father had built. It was a gaming company, a technology enterprise, not a military weapons production facility. Even as he pushed the company farther and farther away from Gozaburo’s shadow, the office never budged. It was like his father could shove the door open at any moment and order Seto out of his chair.

The room felt colder, but then again, it was always colder at night. Despite the wall of plate-glass windows, the room never could keep the heat in. Seto picked his jacket off the back of his ergonomic chair and slipped his arms inside.

He froze and sniffed the collar of the white suit jacket. Why did it smell like a Cuban cigar? Why did it smell like the particular brand that his father always smoked?

His stomach dropped as he realized the smell wasn’t on the jacket alone—the entire room reeked of it. Immediately Seto thought of Gozaburo, his promises and threats during Battle City, and the abuse he had done to Seto under his tutelage. Seto shook and planted both hands on the desk to steady himself.

“You’re not real,” he whispered through clenched teeth.

Gozaburo’s familiar, creepy laugh echoed throughout the room, and Seto felt a cold chill go down his back. He had suspected that the office was haunted. He had seen enough strange spirits during the tournament to have a healthy respect for the supernatural. Hell, he had experienced visions during his duel with Ishizu and Yugi that were impossible to ignore or excuse.

If he was honest with himself, he had thought Gozaburo’s spirit was destroyed at the same time that Noa’s underwater fortress exploded. No, not thought, hoped.

Gozaburo had been his father and tormentor for so much of his life that he understood that part of himself would never be free of him. He had molded him, trained him, and prepared him to be a profiteering strategist poised to outwit some of the most brilliant military strategists in the world.

Then Seto betrayed him, destroyed his reputation, ruined his honor, and ultimately drove him out that window.

“Seto,” the ghostly voice whispered in that gravel tone that could both terrify and demand attention at the same time. Years of drilled repetition pulled Seto’s gaze up to the window where he had stood before.

A shadow stood there with broad shoulders, seeming to suck in the room's light. Seto gasped. Then he saw an orange light flicker to life where the mouth ought to be, and that terrible cigar scent filled his nostrils.

Fury filled him. Seto spun toward him, balling his hands into fists at his sides. “You’re dead,” he cried. “You don’t belong here anymore. Go back to whatever hell you emerged from and get out of my office.”

Seto swiped an arm in front of himself as though he could force the spectre to leave as he would a new employee. But Gozaburo didn’t leave, and the room only got colder. Seto could see his breath as his heart pounded in his chest.

“No,” Gozaburo snarled, and the anger in his voice made Seto flinch backwards. “You will get out of my office, boy.”

The room grew colder and Seto was considering truly leaving his own office, but then the shadow flew toward him. It didn’t merely have his father’s size, it also had his gait, his ferocity, his way of carrying his weight that warned of how quickly he could kill a person if angered. And oh, he was definitely angered.

The shadow encompassed him and Seto felt icy cold as he stumbled backwards, flying a hand to his desk to keep from falling. A sensation came over him that he hadn’t felt since he was a child. He felt powerless, small, trapped in a cage and unable to get out. It was getting hard to breathe, as though the air was getting pulled from his lungs, and all he could smell was the blasted cigar.

The words came to his lips on instinct in a panic. “Father… please…”

Glass shattered, pain shot through his right hand and in an instant the darkness that had been so suffocating lifted.

Seto gasped for air, falling to one knee as he tried to figure out where he had gone and what had happened. His glass of ice water lay fractured on the desk and tiny pieces of it had scraped the skin of his hand, running little trickles of blood down his hand and wrist.

The room was lighter, warmer, and he saw no sign of his father. He breathed a sigh of relief and grabbed some tissues to wrap around his hand.

Seto got to his feet and looked out at the skyline of Domino. He needed help. He couldn’t handle this on his own. If his father could break a water glass, what other types of glass could he break?

#

Seto watched as the physician pulled out the final tiny shard of glass with tweezers, unable to keep from flinching. She held up a shard that was a couple of millimeters wide.

“There we go, that should do it.” She pulled out some disinfectant and wiped down the wound once more before wrapping it. “Give it a week or two and it’ll be as good as new.” She gave him a smile that was supposed to be reassuring, but Seto didn’t acknowledge it.

It would be difficult to explain his injured right hand. Mostly Seto liked to appear almost superhuman in public. He hated showing any kind of weakness. If he was seen in public with a bandaged hand, especially his dueling hand, the tabloids would go into a frenzy.

The glass shards had gone into the back of his hand. Gozaburo had intended to make a statement. The wound was a reminder, just like all the other wounds Gozaburo had given him. It was meant to humiliate him just as much as to remind him.

“you should be all good, Mr. Kaiba.” She said as she got to her feet. “Feel free to come by again if you have any problems.”

Seto stared at her as she pulled off her latex gloves and tossed them in the trash.

“Give me a pair of gloves, preferably in black.”

She looked confused briefly before giving a small nod. “I’ll see what I can find.”

#

It was no minor hindrance flying his Blue-Eyes White Dragon jet one-handed, but Seto managed. Duelist Kingdom was a short thirty minute flight from Domino City. He had no idea if Pegasus was busy, but seeing as it was a Saturday, he assumed not. Pegasus liked his free time.

As soon as he landed on the manicured green lawn near the pool, Seto spotted one of Pegasus’s bodyguards informing the others. He had many of them for someone who lived on an island in a castle. But he knew why.

Pegasus had many enemies. Despite being the creator of one of the most beloved games in the world, Pegasus had more assassination attempts in a month than Gozaburo did in a year. It was partly because of his supposed mafia ties in Las Vegas, but it was also because of his ruthlessness. Seto remembered the research he did years ago before he took part in the Industrial Illusions holographic technology competition. Pegasus was at the top now, but he’d had to work hard to get there.

His past was blemished with mysterious disappearances, bizarre sightings of strange monsters, and even supposed deaths. One of the graphic artists who had worked with him since the beginning of his career had flung himself from the I2 studio late one night. It looked like a suicide in the police reports, but eyewitness accounts had claimed a red serpent had been seen wrapped around the building and flung the man out the window.

Seto had scoffed at those rumors once upon a time, but then he witnessed Slifer the Sky Dragon in person.

Pegasus had guards to protect him from physical threats, but Seto knew he had to have ways of protecting himself from supernatural enemies. At least, he hoped he did. Otherwise, Seto had no viable alternatives.

He walked up the first flight of stairs only to be met by Croquet, Pegasus’s most loyal bodyguard. He stood in Seto’s path, and Seto braced himself to have to force his way through. He really was in no mood to do it, but he needed to speak with Pegasus as discreetly asp possible.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Kaiba, but Master Pegasus isn’t seeing visitors today.”

Seto bristled, “He’ll make an exception for me.”

He moved to step around Croquet, but the man side-stepped so that there was only a foot between them. Now that he was closer, Seto could see he was genuinely concerned. He almost looked embarrassed. It didn’t matter, he had seen Pegasus at his pool before.

“Croquet, I don’t care what he’s doing. I need to see him. Now.”

He shook his head, “Just come another time, won’t you? Let the man enjoy his weekend.”

Seto sighed, taking a single step back. “I guess if he’s that busy…”

Croquet lowered his guard, just a little, but it was enough that Seto could easily push past him. Croquet fell hard on the ground. Seto had years of judo experience to thank for knowing exactly where his center of gravity was and how to topple him quickly.

With long strides he mounted the next flight of stairs with ease, already hearing more guards behind him cry out in surprise.

They were foolish enough to keep a perimeter far from where he guessed Pegasus was hiding. That meant they were either getting sloppy, or Pegasus had wanted privacy. Knowing Seto’s luck, his business partner was asleep.

As he mounted the last set of stairs that led to Peagsus’s pool and garden, he heard a familiar voice.

“My, my, isn’t this an unexpected surprise?”

“Pegasus,” Seto said, still looking around for him. He wasn’t at the patio table or in the pool.

He spotted Pegasus stretched out on his stomach on a lounge chair, wearing a pair of sunglasses and a smirk. Then he saw his bare ass and felt his heart leap up into his throat.

Sure, he found Peagsus attractive, and had even considered asking him on a date once, but it was completely different seeing him splayed out in the nude like some Greek statue. He was infuriatingly perfect.

“If I had known you would be coming, Kaiba-boy, I would have made myself more presentable.”

Pegasus had a mocking tone in his voice, but Seto could see the ruby flush go up his cheeks.

Seto turned away, eyes downcast as his own cheeks burned. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”

“It was bound to happen eventually, I suppose.” Pegasus was known for his infinite cool, but now that he was listening, he could hear the true embarrassment in his voice. “I really would appreciate it if you could call ahead just once. My bodyguards do their best, but you’re always thwarting them. Sometimes I wonder what’s the point of them when you just waltz in all the time.”

Seto winced. “I’m sorry. I guess I associate this place with bad memories, so I’m always on the defensive when I come here.”

He felt a hand on his shoulder and turned to see Pegasus was wearing a bathrobe. He had removed his sunglasses and looked truly concerned. Seto was rarely honest about his feelings, and they both knew it.

“Seto,” Pegasus whispered. “You seem shaken. What’s wrong? What happened?”

Seto pursed his lips and tried to focus on why he came to begin with and not on how nice Pegasus’s ass had looked.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trigger warning: Suicide, patricide, child abuse, and trauma.

Trigger warning: Suicide, patricide, child abuse, and trauma.

Seto stared into his hot mug of green tea. Pegasus was still pouring his own mug and had promised to be with him in a moment. It was surreal seeing him moving around in the kitchen. It was hard to think of Peagsus doing such menial tasks like heating a pot of water without help. That wasn’t fair, though. Pegasus did quite a lot on his own, an unusual trait for a person who was so wealthy—especially since he earned most of his money through inheritance. But looking around, Seto was reminded of just how much Pegasus did on his own.

Although Pegasus’s castle looked fairly medieval on the outside, it was very different indoors. His oil paintings hung everywhere with the watchfulness of statues of Saints in Catholic cathedrals. Dueling arenas sprung up out of seemingly empty space and sprinkled throughout were furniture that indicated his worldly travels. The table they sat at was made of dark woods and offset with gold plated legs and hieroglyphic edges. Gold seemed to inlay all the furniture in the kitchen, giving it a casual richness that probably came at a high price tag.

Instead of oil painted portraits, the walls here were adorned in hieroglyphic reproductions in full color, complete with chariots, Egyptian gods and goddesses, and forgotten rituals. Seto guessed that this room probably reflected his travels and archaeological interests more than most. For Seto, it was oddly soothing.

Pegasus sat down across from him, stirring the honey at the bottom of his mug and still wearing a bathrobe.

“I don’t know why you wanted hot tea,” Seto chided. “It’s already warm outside.”

Pegasus smirked at him, his sheen of hair carefully falling over to hide his missing left eye. “You seemed upset, and I thought hot tea would calm you.”

Seto grunted and took a sip. It had a hint of mint in it and was rather good. “Thank you.”

Pegasus leaned back in his chair. “So, are you going to tell me what’s wrong? Or do I have to pull it out of you?”

“Something happened last night…” Seto paused, but Pegasus gave a chuckle.

“Clearly. Even you don’t wear latex gloves normally. I didn’t even know they came in black.

Seto flinched and took a sip of his tea. That only got him another knowing nod from Pegasus.

“You’ve been trying to hide the fact that it’s injured, but those methods don’t work on me. You should know that by now.”

Seto sighed. “Can you drop the verbal assault already? I came here for help, not to be picked apart by a bored socialite.”

Pegasus flinched that time and lowered his gaze. “Sorry. You have that effect on me, I suppose. Please tell me what happened.”

Seto held the warm mug of tea in his hands, watching the contents slosh around inside as he explained everything: the smell of the Cuban cigar, the looming shadow, the undeniable voice of his long-dead step-father, and finally the attack.

Pegasus was quiet throughout, but he couldn’t repress a gasp at the part where Gozaburo tried to suffocate him to death. He didn’t interrupt, however, and Seto was glad. He didn’t know if he had the strength to tell the tale twice.

“I was told it would take a week or two to heal,” Seto said, looking up at him. Pegasus looked horrified, eyes wide and hand held halfway up to his lips. He shook his head fervently.

“Seto… my God… he could have killed you.”

He shrugged, grateful to take another drink of his tea instead of figuring out a decent response.

“You can’t go back there.”

“I have to,” he stated simply. “It’s my office. The CEO of KaibaCorp has always held that office.”

The fear in Pegasus’s eyes was palpable.

“Besides, if I relocated, what’s to say the ghost won’t do the same?”

“Well, at least you’re acknowledging that it was a supernatural event.”

Seto gave a small smile, “I think I’ve seen enough spiritual bullshit at this point to know when something isn’t supposed to exist. Gozaburo died years ago. He has no business lingering around so long.” Seto hung his head and allowed his shoulders to relax.

“If I’m being honest, I’m tired of dealing with him. His actions have been a plague on Kaiba Corp’s reputation ever since I took over. I still have people who want me dead because of the things he built. He even found a way to upload his rage into a virtual system that intercepted us during Battle City.”

Pegasus narrowed his eye, “Well, that certainly wasn’t on the broadcast I watched.”

“No, we turned off all feeds until we were at the island. If the public knew the full extent of what he was, what he did…” Seto shuddered and clenched his jaw to stop himself. He hated showing any kind of weakness, especially in front of the man he had always looked up to, always aspired to be. He refused to break down just because Peagsus got him a mug of tea and asked to talk. He was not that pathetic.

Pegasus reached across the gilded table and placed a hand on Seto’s. His skin felt impossibly soft. Was everything about him perfect?

“You can’t help what happened. You can’t help what he did to you. You refused him even up to the end, and that takes courage.”

Seto nodded, slowly pulling himself together, but not quite trusting his voice or for his hands to not shake. Pegasus probably saw through it all. Even without the Millennium Eye, he was the most perceptive person Seto knew.

“He wants to rattle you,” Pegasus said in a stern voice. “He wants to frighten you, to make you back down.”

“I know,” Seto muttered. “His talent was always mind games, with competitors, with opponents, with me. He… conditioned me as a child. Even now I still find those old connections still intact, and it terrifies me.” Seto felt his body quake with the words, but he had to tell them, to get them out of his head. “I heard him call my name, and I looked up for him just as obediently as I did when he was alive…”

“Oh, Seto…” Peagsus pulled his left hand off the mug and clasped it in both of his hands. Seto almost felt detached from it, like it belonged to someone else. “To be frank, you need to see a therapist. Gozaburo’s spirit is taking advantage of the cracks he put in your psyche.”

Seto tried to tug his hand away, but Pegasus wouldn’t release him. “I can’t do that. Do you know how many people would want me dead if I shared his secrets? I don’t care if they come after me, but I worry about Mokuba. I don’t want him forever chased by Gozaburo’s legacy like I am. I don’t want him to feel like a military regime is watching his every move, looking for him to slip up, to make a mistake, or to fail. I want him to live a normal life. I want him to make friends, fall in love, and have a happy life. He deserves that.”

Pegasus’s soft fingers rubbed on his calloused hands. There was no judgement in his gaze like Seto had expected, instead there was sadness and pain. “You do know you deserve that too, right? You deserve all those things. You are allowed to be happy too, Seto. You don’t always have to sacrifice yourself.”

Seto blinked at him. “I don’t do that.”

Pegasus rolled his eye. “Please. How many tagged duels have you done with Yugi? And how many of those have you been the one to sacrifice yourself?”

Seto scoffed, but couldn't come up with a retort. He focused instead on Pegasus who turned his hand over and gave it a massage. He winced as he worked on a tight muscle near his thumb.

“I can help you with the ghost, but you need to work on yourself too.”

He gave a quick shake of his head, but Pegasus kneaded his hand again and Seto grunted in pain.

“I mean it, Seto! I may be able to remove him from your office, but if you continue carrying this negative energy around, he’s just going to go elsewhere like you said.” He glanced around and briefly Seto got a glimpse of the man’s shadowy, empty eye socket he tried so hard to keep hidden. “He could relocate to your Blue-Eyes jet, to your bedroom, or even target Mokuba.”

“No.” Seto yanked his hand back and Pegasus’s eye went wide. “I will not let him attack Mokuba. I _can’t_ let him.”

Pegasus pursed his lips. “Have you ever spoken to anyone about what he did to you?”

Seto shook his head, “I’ve mentioned a few things to Mokuba, but I didn’t want to upset him.” Seto thought of the scars he still wore on his back and chest, the physical reminders of the abuse he suffered. He had considered going to get plastic surgery done, but he couldn’t bring himself to explain them to the doctor.

Then he realized there was one other person he had told, long ago, during a time when he was a mental wreck. “The defendant on my case, after Gozaburo died. I had to give testimony about some of it, but he decided not to share it in the case because he thought it might incriminate me.”

“The murder trial, yes, I remember that.” Pegasus let out a slow breath and dragged a hand through his hair. “Goodness, I had almost forgotten. So what you’re telling me is that you’ve never talked about it with anyone? I admit I had gleaned a few details when I had the Eye, but it only saw surface level thoughts, not typically ones buried deep.” He studied him, his brown eye looking at him with renewed sorrow.

“Don’t pity me, Pegasus. The price was worth all that I’ve done with his money and power. If I could do it all over again, I would.”

Pegasus tsked, “There you go, sacrificing yourself again.”

Seto got to his feet. “Look, you said you would help me with the ghost. Will you or are you just wasting my time?”

“I’ll help you, Seto. I like you, you do know that, right?”

Seto didn’t respond, but waited for an answer.

Pegasus sighed, “I’m just trying to help you. Gozaburo sees a weakness in you, and he’s exploiting it.”

Pegasus always had a way of hitting him where it hurt. It stung, but it also made him strangely alluring at the same time. Only a few could truly get under his skin: Mokuba, Yugi, and Pegasus.

“I’ll consider trying to get help after all this is done, but you’ll have to help me find someone who doesn’t mind a patient who was once tried for murder, has an adoptive father who simply won’t die, and has visions of some dead guy in Egypt.”

Pegasus was smiling as he listed off his criteria, but his eye went wide at that last one.

“Wait, you have visions? You never mentioned that!”

Seto turned to leave, smiling at getting the last word in on Pegasus for once.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is part of a Toonshipping challenge I'm doing with @morbid_smile where we write Toonshipping fics each week! This one is turning out to be longer than I expected, not that I'm complaining. I'm enjoy watching these two banter way too much haha.

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of an ongoing #ToonshippingTeamup I'm doing with @morbid_smile where we work on weekly posts for our mutual love of toonshipping. Here's hoping I can knock out the rest of this next week! Hope you enjoy it so far!


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